


Unforeseen Shock

by thisislegit



Category: Lupin III
Genre: Happy Ending, Kidnapping, Multi, Original Character(s), Torture, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-12
Updated: 2020-01-12
Packaged: 2021-02-27 15:53:26
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,657
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22229725
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thisislegit/pseuds/thisislegit
Summary: Goemon’s arm was trembling as he gripped the sheath of Zantetsuken, his eyes narrowed at the screen. Fujiko had both hands over her mouth, her fingers clenched tightly together to keep from shaking while Lupin sat in a similar pose to Halworth, his face carefully shadowed. The trio returned to their room that night after another failed scouting mission. No sign of Jigen with the police, in hiding, at the bar, lost, anything. Fujiko noticed the DVD on the coffee table first. They didn’t know what would be on it.
Relationships: Ishikawa Goemon XIII/Jigen Daisuke/Arsène Lupin III/Mine Fujiko
Comments: 12
Kudos: 99





	Unforeseen Shock

**Author's Note:**

> beta'd by the wonderful [saphura](https://archiveofourown.org/users/isaphura), thank you so much!

All of Jigen’s previous captors had the decency to leave him dressed in something, but, for purposes he didn’t understand, the current one did not. The stone floor felt warm under where his body laid, and he kept his breathing paced as he rolled onto his back. His right eye was swollen shut from the beating yesterday, his depth perception temporarily lost. The clinking of chains and the discomfort from his new position forced him to arch his back. They must’ve switched him from rope to metal chains while he slept. The steel beams on the ceiling were corroded with years of rust meaning they moved him as well. The last warehouse had a wood ceiling with a few shoddily done patches to cover the draft. There was no such cover here. Water dripped from a leaky pipe nearby. Or was that from the roof?

He turned back onto his side, the chains digging into his spine too much and tried looking around the room. There were only two guards. He wasn’t sure whether to be insulted or worried about that. He was used to five or ten stationed around him at all times. Apparently, he was just as dangerous unarmed as he was armed. When he tried to shift his legs, he heard the jingling of chains around his calves. This guy really wasn’t giving him any leeway, huh? Jigen raised his neck as best as he could to see what else was in front of him. There was a long table with a bunch of shit on top he couldn’t make out. Dangling from the edge was a bloodied rope he knew he was in the day before. Next to that sat a clean strip of barbed wire. Maybe it was best he didn’t pass out after today’s interrogation. He wouldn’t want to wake up with _that_ tied around his arms.

The creak of the door grabbed his attention, and he’d roll over if exhaustion wasn’t starting to eat away with him. He was getting too old for this kidnapping nonsense. Someone’s shoes clicked along the floor behind him getting closer and closer until they stopped. Something smooth and cold poked his back before a white leather shoe stepped over him. The other one followed, and he saw the pristine but damp edges of purple pants.

“Jigen Daisuke. It’s so nice to meet you in person.” His captor’s voice was the same range as Lupin’s but lighter, a tenor. Said captors face came within sight next. Not exactly what he was expecting since the man was handsome, not his type, but generically so with light brown hair, blue eyes, and fair skin. However, he noticed the irregularities, the first being that his cheeks and lips were too pink. The next one was his skin. It was smooth. Polished and shiny like someone took a wax machine and a brush to a new hardwood floor until anyone could slip on it. His eyes were off too. Wider than usual, and his nose narrow and as small as a button. He looked plastic. It was unnerving, and any notion of him being generically handsome jumped out the window because of it.

“You gonna kill me or what?” Jigen’s voice scratched against his vocal cords, and he regretted opening his mouth. He needed water.

The man smiled, shaking his head as he made a gesture to one of the guards. Jigen found himself being yanked up by his hair and water poured over his face. He choked on some of it because the asshole decided pouring a bucket of water into his mouth was a good idea. By the time the thing was empty, his hair stuck to his face leaving him coughing in a cool puddle.

“My name is Halworth. I’m a chemist, engineer, businessman, and sometimes a thief just like you.” Halworth tapped the tip of Jigen’s nose for the last three words of his sentence. “You’re very close to Arsene Lupin III, and I know he has quite the fortune. Daisuke, I want you to tell me where all of his hidden stashes are.”

“Answer’s the same as yesterday.”

Halworth nodded, his lips turning down into a pout, “I know. I watched from the cameras as you said, ah, what was the language you used? You didn’t know jack shit and even if you did we’d be too stupid to follow directions.”

“Then why’re you asking again?”

“Because I’m polite, Daisuke. I knew you wouldn’t talk if I just had them rough house you around, and you didn’t! Which was so exciting to watch. It makes me want to push you. Test your limits. Your loyalties. I’ve been watching you for a long time you know.” Halworth stood up and went over to the long table.

Jigen’s eye followed the eerily straight line of his legs since he had nothing else to do. The guy wore purple pants, and a white button-down. There was nothing particularly special about his style of dress. No accessories, no dramatic patterns or unusual materials, not even a pair of glasses on his face. If one didn’t look close enough to see his plastic-like features, they’d assume him another face in the crowd. Which would make sense for how Jigen was snatched off the street so easily. He didn’t remember much past his first drink at a bar when he woke up tied in a chair for the beat down yesterday. Now he was here.

Halworth stepped away from the table holding a baton. Footsteps rang from behind Jigen as a third guard stepped over his body to walk and stand beside Halworth. His captor then cranked a dial on the baton all the way around, the metal rod lighting with electricity. Jigen watched with horror as Halworth touched his guard with the tip causing him to scream and convulse with pain until he fell to the floor with a thud. His body smoked, and the scent of burning flesh permeated the air. The other two guards didn’t even flinch, their sunglasses gave them the aura of statues. Jigen was certain it could’ve been either of them under that execution and the reaction would’ve been the same. If that was meant to unnerve him, it worked.

“It has ten settings, and that was the highest. I won’t do that to you though.” Halworth turned the dial down to level one. “You see, Daisuke, when it comes to torture I believe in the building blocks method. One brick at a time.”

The tip of the baton touched the chains on his arms, and he yelled as electricity burned up his arms. His body shook. His heart raced in his chest. Then his muscles locked up. His jaw slack and open until the burning stopped. Wheezing, he felt the ground shift as he was lifted up by his hair again.

“I apologize. I forgot about the water. Let’s get you dry.” Halworth snapped his fingers.

The two guards lifted him from the puddle and moved him closer towards the table, resting him on a towel. Halworth whistled while there was the click and sudden whirring of a blow dryer to overshadow his happy tune. He cradled the back of Jigen’s neck while he worked the water off. The fingers tapping over the skin of his neck felt intimate and he wanted to pull away. What the fuck was wrong with this guy? After Jigen was dry, Halworth rolled him back to his original spot on the floor in the middle of the room.

“Daisuke dear. Where are Lupin’s treasures?” He turned the crank on the baton up to two.

“You tell me.”

The metal tip touched his skin this time, and Jigen’s body convulsed with the rise in intensity. His vision went from limited to blurring. His throat was so raw when the baton was removed it was like someone dropped a ring of old keys down his throat and yanked it out. Halworth knelt down at his side, rubbing his bicep and shushing him in comfort. Well, wasn’t that enough to make you sick. He wanted to wrench himself away from the touch, but he was shuddering too hard to manage anything other than dry, ugly pants.

“It’s all right. It’s all right, you’re doing so well. Better than I expected.” Halworth cranked the baton up to three and pressed the tip against his stomach.

Jigen didn’t even hear himself scream, the room flooding with white noise, and the thudding of his own heart in his ears. Black ate away the edges of his blurred vision, and he could’ve sworn he would tear his own muscles from how high strung they’d come with this shock. He wasn’t aware of how much time passed, or if there was blood or drool leaking from the corner of his lips when his senses returned. A hand stroked his cheek, raising the stubble and flattening it in little circles. There was a rustle of paper. Briefly, his cheek felt the humid air in the warehouse before being returned to a cool surface. A familiar scent of burned hair and skin made him wince. That wasn’t good.

“Daisuke dear, this is a map. You don’t have to say anywhere specific right now. I know your throat is a little taxed.” Halworth pressed his cheek harder against the paper. “Use your nose, your tongue, just point to a country so I can figure out where to get started.”

Jigen’s tongue felt thick in his mouth, his good eye making out the countries in their pastel arrangement on a wide expanse of blue. Shifting his head, he pressed his lips against the paper. There was barely any spit left on his tongue, but he managed to get a piece damp enough for his teeth to clamp onto an edge. Using what strength he had left, he turned his neck tearing the paper and a long strip from the map with a pained smile on his face. Halworth could eat his ass for all he cared.

“Hm. That’s cute. You’re cute.” Halworth pulled the strip of paper from his mouth and tossed it aside.

He listened as the footsteps went back to the table. There was scraping and the _tink tink tink_ of metal tapping.

Halworth came back in sight with a first aid kit, and he sat down cross-legged in front of Jigen. A scapel in one hand as he said, “My father was a nurse. He told me all sorts of things about the types of patients that would come in, but since we lived in the mountains and tourists loved the snow, his most common case was hypothermia.”

Jigen said nothing. There was no point mincing words if you weren’t going to tell your captor the information they wanted.

“I’m sure you know when people are on the verge of death from hypothermia they feel comfortably warm, and then they fall asleep, and die. That was the first type of chemical I worked on for the death penalty. Painless executions have gotten popular recently, and the regular injection method was being questioned in multiple countries needing a solution. I still haven’t sold it yet, but as a businessman I have to wait for when the need is at it’s highest. You understand.”

God, would this guy shut up?

“After finishing it, boredom pushed me to start working on something else.” Halworth used the scalpel to make a small cut below Jigen’s elbow. It was shallow, similar to a paper cut. “You know that burning feeling you get when your gloves aren’t enough, and the circulation in your fingers slows down to a snail’s pace in order to conserve warmth? I worked on intensifying that.” He put down his scalpel and put on a pair of latex gloves. From the first aid kit came a bandaid and a tube labeled burn cream. He poured a dollop on top of the fabric of bandaid, spread it around, and placed it over Jigen’s cut.

Ten seconds passed without much of a change, but Halworth stared at the face of his watch, his gaze intent. Five more seconds went by, and Jigen’s arm began to numb out from the cut down to his fingers. Two more seconds and the numbness spread to his shoulder, the area below his elbow switching from numb to stiff. Three more seconds turned his arm cold. Four more, and his arm burned. Another five, and he was writhing in pain. Two more and it was as if someone poured gasoline on his bare skin and struck a match. Halworth had both arms holding down Jigen’s shoulders to keep him from rolling around the floor trying to put out a fire with no flame.

It was going to pick away at him. It was going to spread. It was spreading and spreading, and he couldn’t put it out. He couldn’t move. He needed to move, and he couldn’t move, and he couldn’t breathe. There wasn’t enough oxygen in the room. The fire was using it all leaving him to suffocate in the gray clouds; the ashes clogging his lungs thicker than cigarette smoke but with none of the nicotine. Only poison and burning and searing until he was panting, sweaty and disheveled on the floor, still chained with the sight of rusty metal beams above him.

“Daisuke dear.” Halworth moved his sweaty bangs from Jigen’s face with concern in his eyes. “Would you tell me where his treasures are?”

Jigen weighed his options. He honestly wasn’t sure how much more of this he could take. Yet, he also knew what happened to victims when the captor got all the information they wanted. He couldn’t stall Halworth off the torture. He wasn’t a smooth talker like Lupin or Fujiko, he wasn’t disciplined like Goemon, and he was always more willing to turn down a job if it seemed impossible or not worth the money. So he thought about it. He really thought about if Lupin’s hoards, his secrets, his trust, was worth more than his own life.

“You need a plane.” Jigen started.

Halworth stroked his fingers along his beard, clearly pleased. “Yes?”

“South Atlantic. Lat’s minus 55, long’s minus 2,” he wheezed.

Halworth nodded getting one of his guards to start writing it down.

“There’s a whirlpool surrounding the island,” he paused to take a breath, “Stops when the tide is low.”

“Uh-huh.”

“And when you get there.” Jigen’s neck rolled so he could look at Halworth with his good eye. “You can say you landed on the hole in the devil’s ass crack.” He started snickering at his own joke as he turned his head away from Halworth’s hand. His wheezy laughter got interrupted with the occasional cough.

Halworth laughed with him. The noise bounced off the walls echoing strangely in the bare warehouse. Machines older than dirt that were pushed to the corners to grow black mold were listening to their first positive sound in a decade. Jigen knew he sounded crazy, his own laughter growing louder and more interspersed with coughing. He wondered if it was from madness or acceptance for what was going to happen next. There was a click, and the touch of metal, before his laughter turned into screaming.

* * *

The screen changed to Halworth’s face, one cheek resting on a closed fist, and his elbow resting on the arm of the fluffy chair he sat in. “Amazing, isn’t he? That was only day two! We’re just now finishing day three? Four? Four, right Lupin?”

Goemon’s arm was trembling as he gripped the sheath of Zantetsuken, his eyes narrowed at the screen. Fujiko had both hands over her mouth, her fingers clenched tightly together to keep from shaking while Lupin sat in a similar pose to Halworth, his face carefully shadowed. The trio returned to their room that night after another failed scouting mission. No sign of Jigen with the police, in hiding, at the bar, lost anything. Fujiko noticed the DVD on the coffee table first. They didn’t know what would be on it.

“I hope you’re not upset. I tried other things. We got to a point where I had to put a gag in his mouth. Had a few “what if he bites his tongue off” scares, but no harm no foul. He’s all in one piece, for now.” Halworth leaned forward in his chair, “By the by, how did you do it? He won’t say a peep. Was it money? Threats? Drugs? Sex? It was sex, wasn’t it? Nothing like emotional attachments to reel someone in and keep them there, right?”

The tension in the tiny hotel room was thick enough to cut with the back of a spoon.

“So, here’s my proposition. There’s a locker in the station nearest your hotel, the number is 356. At 1AM, the last train will have left the station, you’re going to drop off the map of every location you’ve hidden your fortune in. One of my men will be there to pick up the package at 2AM. You will not follow him. You will not leave a tracker on the maps. In fact, you should be sleeping soundly in your nice soft bed when he gets them. After I receive the locations, I will personally check and empty each one to ensure its validity. When that’s all said and done, and all that’s left are your building assets, I will return Daisuke to you in one piece.”

Lupin tapped his fingers against his knee.

Halworth leaned forward in his seat and pulled up a long wooden box. “If there is a tracker on the maps, Daisuke will be shot immediately at the first sound of trouble. If you follow my guard, Daisuke will be shot immediately at the first sight of trouble. If the maps are falsehoods, I will continue with my torture, and if you fail to deliver the maps at all.” He pulled out what was clearly a bone saw. “There will be something for you in the locker at 5AM. I was thinking a toe or an ear, but I have fallen a little in love with Daisuke’s hands. I’m sure you have as well.” He posed his hand like it was a gun at the camera, “Bang.”

The video ended with static on the screen.

“Lupin. What do we do?” Fujiko asked. Sweat had built on the back of her neck. The video was something else. Who was that man? What other horrible things had he done to Jigen? Not to mention, he only promised Jigen back in one piece. He never said he’d be breathing.

“Hm?” Lupin blinked up at her. “Oh, I’m going to bed.”

No sooner had those words left his mouth was there the point of a sword in his face. Goemon’s expression was a neutral mask. “I want you to choose your next words carefully, Lupin.”

“Hey! It’s not my fault he chose the guy who wouldn’t squeal.”

Fujiko walked over to place a hand on Goemon’s arm, “Lupin. You’re really not going to save Jigen?”

“Even if I gave him the locations of my stuff, it’d take him months to empty all of them. It’s better if we wait for him to get bored,” Lupin crossed his arms behind his head and yawned. “Either way, I’m not losing any sleep over it.”

“You-!”

“Stop it.” Fujiko gripped Goemon’s bicep. “Put it away, Goemon. You know as well as I do we can’t make Lupin do anything he doesn’t want to do.”

“But Jigen.”

“It’s all right. I know about some of Lupin’s stashes. I’ll even slip in a couple of my own. We can put some maps in the locker to hold Halworth off until we find where he is.”

Lupin was out of his chair, his tone accusatory. “That’s betrayal. You can’t just give up my finances for your plan!”

“Are you saying your money is more important than Jigen’s life?” Fujiko’s voice reached a higher note in surprise.

“YES.”

She slapped him hard enough that his ass hit the floor with a thud. “Lupin. I thought you had a heart. I thought you cared about people. But you’re just as awful and terrible as Halworth. Moron. Idiot. Asshole! I hate you!”

Lupin rubbed his cheek, wincing in pain, and glared up at her.

“Come on, Goemon.” Fujiko led the swordsman out, both of them with matching scowls on their faces.

The thief waited until the door slammed behind them before shouting, “FINE. GOOD LUCK WITH YOUR STUPID PLAN.”

He went over to the DVD player and took out the disk the recording was on. Flipping it over a few times, he shrugged. No point in keeping it when he knew the message, so into the trash it went. He yawned again, covering his mouth as he went to the bedroom. It was late, and he planned on sleeping in tomorrow.

* * *

Being unconscious and sleeping didn’t feel like the same thing. His eye was still swollen shut, and the fluctuating temperatures made him dizzy and incoherent. Maybe that was the point. One hour it was unbearably humid, and the next the air was so cold and dry he felt an illness coming on. His body would shiver rattling the chains. A sick type of music that worsened the ache in his jaw from the gag. The tap tap tapping of shoes from behind pushed him to try and slow his heart rate. He moved each toe to check for feeling on the right foot and then on the left. He did the same with his hands, each finger curling in to touch his palm before he’d try it with the next. They’d stopped touching his palm sometime yesterday, and only the tops of his fingers bent when he tried now. He would finish by the time Halworth grabbed his shoulder to roll him over.

A myriad of bandages covered both of his arms. Burn marks mixed with the older scars, and most of his body hair had been singed off from electric shocks, hot wax, or actual torches. His body a Pollock painting of freshly sinewed flesh and cuts. He couldn’t bend his legs. They wouldn’t even move. Neither would his arms, the numbness a new normal instead of an unnatural feeling he’d try to shake off time and time again. He never thought his death would be this slow and painful. He expected a shootout. A pinch before instant blackness. Instead, he was being rolled onto his back, forced to see Halworth’s stupid face because the bastard couldn’t blind him with some peroxide solution like he’d been saying hours before.

“Daisuke dear.” Halworth held a can of shaving cream and a hand razor.

Come on. He already lost his dignity. Did he really have to add insult to injury? Two big hands clamped down on the sides of his head as shaving cream was applied in big globs over his face. The razor came down to glide through the cream. Swipe. Scrape. Swipe. Halworth wiped the excess cream and hair from the blade on the towel and brought it back to his jaw to continue the process. Swipe. Scrape. Swipe. Clean. Jigen breathed through his nostrils. A part of him wanted to count the seconds. The swipes. He’d noticed himself thinking in patterns since the torture increased in intensity and it helped to keep him grounded. There was no telling if Lupin would come, if the thief knew he was gone. Jigen assumed he didn’t. Halworth had enough money to send a body double that’d last long enough. How much hair had he lost? Took him months to grow the damn thing in as thick as it got, and here he was returning to square one.

Halworth used a hot towel to wipe his face clean, but funnily enough he could still feel hair on his face when his jaw twitched. Halworth held a compact mirror up to him. Ah. Only a trim. The bastard really was playing with him.

“Lupin isn’t coming for you.” Halworth put the mirror away. “When one of my men got to the locker last night, it was empty.”

Locker? The fuck was he talking about?

“I have a man on the inside who was kind enough to check the cameras. The lovely Fujiko and serious Goemon placed papers in there. Maps I asked for. Do you want to know what happened at 1:30 in the morning?” Halworth hauled him up by the chains on his forearms and dragged him over to the torture table. “Lupin came and emptied the locker. Can you believe it? He really doesn’t care if you lose that trigger finger of yours.”

The front of his calves scraped along the floor, causing some of the smaller bandaids to peel off and fall onto the ground. Needle marks became visible along with nasty, purple bruising. If that dumb monkey of a man didn’t give him a closed casket funeral he’d be so pissed. He’d haunt him for the next thirty years. Jigen would be damned letting anyone see him like this. Halworth held him upright, but Jigen’s body lolled to the side of it’s own accord. His nerves were fried.

“I felt guilty when I saw that, so I decided I’ll let you pick my next method. Now first, I’ve got these pills. They recreate the feeling of being in the last stages of starvation. One pill lasts ten minutes.” Halworth used his free hand to hold up a light blue capsule pill the size of mint. He set it down to pull a round container over. “I also have this cream with napalm. Oh, and this pill causes magnified hearing ability. Even the briefest tapping of fingers can give you a migraine. Lasts for an hour.”

He’d let go of Jigen to grab a yellow container, and Jigen fell in a heap. His body hit the table scattering some of the supplies. His knees failed to hold him there, so he slid down, crashing to the floor with a sickening crack. He still had his vision, so it wasn’t his neck. Must’ve been a rib. Or a bone in his arm. Was it broken or fractured? Cracked?

“Daisuke dear.” Halworth chastised. He pulled Jigen back up by the chains on his forearms and shook his head with a smile. “You’re amazing, you know? If my guards were at least half as loyal as you are without the chip in their heads, I would’ve destroyed Lupin in a few hours.”

The gag came off with a string of drool attached to it.

“I’d want you on my side, but I’m sure all the torture hasn’t really made you think well of me, and I’d hate to chip you. It destroys the imagination, which is one of the things I love most about you. You’re so clever.”

Jigen wanted him to shut the fuck up already. Physical torture was one thing, but psychological was a minefield he’d prefer to leave untreaded. He couldn’t keep his neck upright for longer than half a second, his cheek grazing his shoulder as more spit came from his open mouth. One more hit with the baton, and he didn’t think he’d be this coherent the next time he woke up. His body dropped to the floor in a heap.

Halworth crossed his arms over his chest with one hand tapping his chin. “I thought about collaring you, but I know you’d bite and bite and bite until I had to put you down, and I wouldn’t want that. It’d be a waste.”

One of the guards grabbed him by the ankle, dragging him to the center of the room on his side. More bandages peeled off his arm revealing cuts that scabbed over or were still pink with blood ready to drip free. When he stopped moving, he began to flex his fingers. Thumb. Pointer. Middle. Ring. Pinky. He switched hands repeating the pattern. Back and forth. Back and forth. Liquid steamed and bubbled from the table Halworth worked at. The air in the room grew thick with humidity as he flexed his fingers. Thumb. Pointer. Middle. Ring. Pinky. Switch. Thumb. Pointer. Middle. Ring. Pinky. Switch. Thumb. Pointy. Middle. Ring. Pink. Thumb middle. Wait. That wasn’t right. Start over. Thumb. Pointer. Ring. Pinky. Middle. Thumb. Thumb. Pointer. Pinky. Middle. Ring. Ring. What was ringing? What was that ringing sound?

A barrel of a gun pressed against his ear, and he closed his eye. _Finally._ There was a click of the chamber and a shot rang through the air. He waited. And waited. Yet, he could still feel the pulse points of pain along his body. Don’t tell him that fucker _missed_. His mind registered the sounds of a scuffle. More gunshots. Someone making weird kung fu noises. Laughter. Oh good, his vision was blurring out. Soft hands turned him onto his stomach, the chains around his arms loosening. He knew the voices were closer, but they weren’t much clearer. All he heard was his name before he went limp.

“Jigen? Jigen?” Fujiko placed a hand on his cheek, then placed her hand under his nostrils. “He’s still breathing.”

“Good. Call a doctor on your way back to the hotel. The one that isn’t bugged,” Lupin stood above the now handcuffed Halworth.

Goemon sheathed his sword. The guards were too far gone to save. He didn’t look forward to removing the bodies. “What will you do, Lupin?”

“I’ll stick around for clean-up. Get rid of anything before Pops starts snooping around.” He said that, but he went over to the torture table to poke corked vials and shake pill bottles.

“…I apologize for assuming the worst of you.”

“What’d I tell you Goemon? If you want to trick your enemies, you have to trick your friends. No hard feelings. Now go on.” Lupin put on a clean pair of latex gloves. “I’ll meet up with you in a couple hours. Three at max.”

Fujiko helped get Jigen into Goemon’s arms without jostling him too much. “I think one of his ribs is broken. You’ll have to hold him in the backseat.”

“That’s fine.”

Lupin watched them go.

“You four are quite the group,” Halworth said from his spot on the floor.

“Mmhm.” Lupin looked over the table’s contents. The stack of file folders with chemical properties, reactions, and results. Dozens of half empty pill bottles labeled with dosages and side effects. Vials of liquid that appeared clear and benign. Others with tints of blue or green, and a few bubbling with carbonation. Jars sealed with tape. A metal baton with a crank on it. Bloodied rope. Clean barbed wire. A can of shaving cream. A hair dryer. First aid kit. A comb and a brush. Soap in an empty bucket, the edges wet with condensation. Contact lenses. Mortar and pestle. Injection needles. Two boxes of latex gloves. More files and folders. A camera. He paused at the camera and picked it up. Should he?

He pressed the memory folder. They were pictures of Jigen. Videos too. At least 300 of them altogether. Lupin turned around and leaned his lower back on the tables’ edge as he flipped through them. The more he browsed, the worse they got. The videos were mercifully short. Five to fifteen seconds at the most. Five seconds was still too much. Too awful. He removed the SD card and snapped it in half, then picked up the mortar and pestle to grind it into dust while pondering what to do. Halworth was young, bold, and new to criminal business. Nothing like his mother who knew how to pick her battles when she ran his company. Lupin didn’t like that someone like him pulled one over on one of his own. He never did, but there were boundaries his past enemies committed to. No one ever went this far, and if he went easy on Halworth, someone else might try again.

“You’re ignoring me. I understand. I’m sure you don’t even want to look at me.”

He set the mortar and pestle aside. Unfortunately, Lupin needed to make an example of him. The law would only offer him protection from the thief, and Halworth’s money would free him of real consequences. Taking a file from the bunch, he flipped it open to a random page. Oh, there was an idea. Lupin put on a face mask and started grabbing vials. The injection needles were used, but he’d have to make do.

He spoke up while slicing open the tape on one of the jars, “I want to apologize in advance. I tend to have a strict no kill policy.”

“So what? You’re going to torture me like I did your partner?”

“Oh no. I _am_ killing you.”

Halworth paled. “What?”

Lupin worked his concoction into a froth with a thick brush, barely registering Halworth’s sputtering in the background. He might be here for a little over two hours. He opened the contents of a blue capsule pill pouring it into the frothy mixture in the dish and set it aside. Searching through the vials, he grabbed an injection needle to extract the contents. When Lupin turned around, Halworth was sweating through his white shirt. He bent down to raise a sleeve. The needle pressed into the inside of Halworth’s elbow until it broke the skin.

“But I want you to be awake til the last second, and this should do the trick.”

* * *

Jigen woke up to the feeling of eyes on him. It was bright, and warm. His arms rested at his sides under the blankets, and a pillow kept his head propped up on the mattress. A really soft mattress. Panic built in his chest when he failed to move his fingers, but it was replaced with relief when he recognized the familiar drug of morphine numbing any pain his body should be feeling right now. It wouldn’t last long, but it was much needed. He was able to open one eye, the other covered with bandages.

“You’re awake.” Fujiko’s voice came from his bedside.

Jigen made a noise in his throat. It was the most he could do. His tongue sat drier than sandpaper in his mouth, and he was not about to try talking after screaming for the last week.

“Guess who has _nerve damage_ ,” Fujiko partially sang.

Jigen made an annoyed sound.

She closed her magazine and scooted her chair closer to the edge of the bed, “The doctor said the electric shocks alone should’ve killed you, but turns out you’re the most stubborn man on the planet.”

He wanted to say “guess you’re stuck with me for life”, but all that came out was a less than haughty sound. It was for the best. He didn’t want to risk being romantic from this position. Talk about embarrassing. Suddenly, Fujiko’s face was much closer than he was paying attention to and soft, tacky lips touched his. He couldn’t even wipe the lip gloss off after she moved away.

“Don’t get snatched again, okay?” Her voice shook on the last word.

He made a noise he thought was affirming, but meant “I’ll do my best”.

She accepted that with a nod and leaned back in her seat to open her magazine. “So, let’s talk about those bets you placed on the horse race before all this. It’s bad.”

Jigen made a desperate sound and tried in vain to move his legs to escape. He was pretty sure he was not supposed to be put under stress during his recovery. She didn’t take much time to go over his lost bets, all of them, but instead of giving him the results at the same time, she interjected a loss after different gossip articles until he nodded off.

When he woke up the next time, there was someone holding his hand, and a body in his bed. Dim light came from the curtains, nothing like when he first woke up. Was it the late afternoon or evening? Hell, maybe it was cloudy or about to rain. This place got a lot of rain. He must’ve made a noise when he opened his eye this time because the culprit in his bed gave his hand a light squeeze.

“You are braver than I am,” Goemon said from beside him.

He tried to see Goemon from the corner of his eye, his neck not allowing him any movement, but the swordsman’s hair was carefully curtained over his face. Jigen knew even if he could move his bangs out of his face, Goemon would school his features to be unreadable anyway.

“It is rare that I feel helpless.”

Jigen made a hmh in his throat he hoped came off as “is that so?”

Goemon gave Jigen’s hand another gentle squeeze, “I have seen you in unpleasant situations before, but this was the first time you were alone after…”

After Goemon hopped in on what he was doing with the other two? After he found himself just as attached to the group as the others? After they got busy and did the dirty in the back of the RV for the first of many times to follow?

“After we expanded our partnership.”

Oh, so that’s what they were calling it.

“It felt. The feelings I had, I knew them, anger, sadness, concern, but they felt-,” He bit his lip.

New? Scary? Different?

“Visceral.” Goemon lifted his head, so his bangs fell to the wayside revealing a narrowed eye. “Do not put me through that again.”

Straight to the point, this guy was. Jigen made a confirming sound in his throat and focused hard enough to move one of his fingers trapped between Goemon’s. There was a soft sigh from his bedmate, and Jigen found himself relaxing internally. Physically, he was still useless, but his heartbeat remained steady.

“Now go back to sleep so I can change the drainage bag for your catheter.”

 _His_ _WHAT_?

“Your pulse speed has increased. Do not be surprised, Jigen. We’ve been rotating this job for the last week.”

He’d been unconscious for a week? He swore he just listened to Fujiko this morning! Was it even this morning?

“Your pulse is increasing further.” Goemon got up from the bed and walked to the other side where two IV drips and several vials of medicine sat. “You must be in pain. I’ll apply the appropriate dosage of your medication.”

No, what Goemon needed to do was apply some answers to his damn questio-ooh his brain felt heavy. He managed to blink twice before sleep took him under again.

The next time Jigen’s eye opened, there was a dull ache over his entire body. Seems like they were switching him to lighter drugs. A distinct weight rested on his stomach, but he couldn’t see who since his room was dark. His hands were on top of the covers, and he slid one over to test and see if he could. Thank god he could move his hand. Pain shot up his arm. Fuck, why did he move his hand? The figure on his stomach shifted, lifting their head.

“Good morning sunshine, or, night really.” Lupin’s easy tone filled the silence of the room.

Jigen grunted, his fingers shifting on top of the blanket.

“I’d ask how you’re feeling, but I have a pretty good idea.”

There was one less IV drip hooked in his arm which must’ve been a good sign. There were also less vials of medicine.

“You know Halworth sent us a video of you. You were Mr. Tough Guy the whole time. _Where’s Lupin’s treasures? My answer hasn’t changed._ _Where are the treasures, Daisuke? Check the devil’s ass crack._ Hehehehehehe. ” Lupin was talking at a rapid-fire pace with his impressions, and Jigen admitted to himself that he had a little trouble following everything.

“And when he pulled out the baton, and you were so cool with the map and laughing in his smug face, I thought you were gonna tear through the chains with your bare hands and hit him with it. Beat up all the goons and leave with a cigarette hanging from your mouth like you always do.” His hands were moving in big gestures, his whole upper body animated from where he sat on the carpet. “And then we’d all be watching the DVD from the couch, cheering like “Waaah, Jigen, go Jigen!” Then suddenly the door would open, and you’d be there in a new suit, and ask us _did you like the show_? With your cool-guy American accent, and we’d say, wow Jigen, you’re so cool! But…” Lupin’s hands dropped back to the bed.

But?

“That would’ve been pretty impossible, yeah?”

Jigen didn’t know there was a recording of him like that, but he knew Lupin’s addition was too ridiculous even for him. Where was he going with this?

“Pretty impossible,” Lupin repeated, his voice trembling on a high note.

He didn’t make a sound waiting for the other shoe to drop. What could Lupin have seen to make his breath catch on every inhale? For his hands to tremble when they rested on top of Jigen’s covered thigh? For him to slowly lean his head back until the front of his neck was exposed like he was fighting back tears that Jigen couldn’t see? When he let his head fall forward, Jigen wondered if he won or lost the fight.

“Do you hate me for this?”

He was spending too much time with Goemon for him to ask Jigen loaded questions when he was unsure of his ability to form words. So, he took some time to think about it. If there was any hate for Lupin, from his antics to his enemies, it was never directed at the man himself, but the situation.

He hated being immobile, hated not being able to smoke, loathed that there was a piss bag strapped to his leg, but none of those sour feelings were toward the man in front of him. Jigen knew what he signed up for. He knew there were enemies Lupin had made with every heist. He knew those enemies would come after whatever they deemed a weakness, or would try to make a weakness. He knew that no matter the level of precaution they took, there was always the chance someone wouldn’t make it back as well as he knew to always keep his gun within reach. The truth of the matter was, with the expectation of being captured here and there, no one could manage to predict the moves the captor would make without information. The drugging was sudden. The kidnapping random. The enemy new. It was bound to happen at least once. They’d just have to try and make sure it didn’t happen again. It’s all they could do. It’s all they ever did.

Jigen moved his hand to his stomach and tapped his fingers. An invitation for Lupin to return to his position allowing Jigen to place his hand on top of his hair. He watched the line of Lupin’s shoulders tighten and softly scratched his head as best he could. First there was a hiccup. Second came a muffled sob. Some of his blanket slipped down his shoulders due to Lupin balling his fists in the fabric. He stroked the short brown strands, listening to Lupin cry it out until the drugs took him under.

This time when he woke up, he could open both eyes. The sun was shining brightly through the open window, and there were multiple weights on the bed. One was lying beside him, holding his hand, their fingers interlaced. Another was laying with their head on his stomach. The last was at the foot of the bed, with one long-nailed hand rubbing up and down his ankle.

“I gotta piss.” It hurt to talk. Everything hurt, but it hurt the most to talk.

“Jigen!” All three of his partners looked at him with varying degrees of shock.

“We expected that. The doctor removed your catheter last night,” Fujiko said.

“Fucking hell.”

“How do you think we felt? It was literally grab and send, grab and send. You spent the last two weeks draining out unknown substances. That guy packed you with more drugs than a pharmacy. You’re lucky your liver could handle it.” Lupin moved to rest his elbow on the bed, cradling his cheek in his hand.

“Everything hurts.”

Goemon sat up in bed, “That’s the nerve damage.”

“ _I know_.” He was being propped up, the numerous pillows from the other bed and some couch cushions placed behind him to keep him upright. A cup of water was held in front of him with a straw so he could take a few sips. Jigen found he could keep his head upright, but his limbs were heavy, and his fingers itched for a cigarette. “Smoke?”

Fujiko chose that moment to turn her back to him.

“Don’t tell me.”

Lupin was cradling both cheeks in his hands now. “Doctor says no to that for three months.”

“Load me up with morphine.”

“Your prescription ran out.”

Goemon interjected, “You’re also required to do physical therapy for the next five weeks, otherwise there’s a risk of blood clots. Since you’re awake, we can start tomorrow.”

Jigen let out a long groan, sinking back into the pillows. He needed to process how he was going to face the seven circles of hell within the next three months. Goemon returned to lie on his side, taking Jigen’s hand in his own to interlace their fingers. Lupin rested his head on Jigen’s stomach, despite Jigen’s initial comment about needing the bathroom. Fujiko’s hand returned to his ankle stroking in mindless circles as she read the newspaper. Everything still hurt. The bed was cramped, and he was somewhat uncomfortable, but a smile came to his face nonetheless.

**Author's Note:**

> i got mad so i made this but i dont like sad endings so it went from 3k to 7k, what can u do


End file.
